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18 Aug 2017 3:17:40pm

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Psychologists emphasise that actions have consequences, as do inactions.You can’t change natural laws which control the universe. The sun heats Earth but the Stefan-Boltzmann law tells us that Earth is warmer than it should be from this heat. That’s because of greenhouse gases like CO2, methane and water vapour, which trap heat like a blanket around Earth. Warming from CO2 evaporates water, maintaining it in the atmosphere, where the water vapour produces a fast, warming feedback. The result is CO2 controls the Earth’s temperature by controlling water vapour.Measurements at the top of the atmosphere show Earth is out of energy balance because it takes in about 0.5 W/m2 more energy, than it radiates away. This results from too much greenhouse gas, trapping heat in the atmosphere. To bring Earth back into balance we must reduce CO2. Scientists have pointed out that failure to reduce CO2 will have very serious consequences. The warming that has already happened as a result of human burning of fossil fuels is now irreversible for a period of around 1,000 years, but any further warming can be stopped.Fred, scientists do have viable solutions.Calculations show that a reduction from about the current level [400ppm] to about 360 ppm would increase Earth’s radiation to space by 0.5 W/m2; which will balance Earth’s energy budget and will stop further warming. If emissions fall, the CO2 level in the atmosphere will also fall and will immediately produce a fall in the rate of global warming. Any further increase in warming produced by CO2 depends entirely on current emissions. So the warming between now and 2050 (and beyond) depends only on the total of the emissions between now and then. Failure to act will continue to cause enormous financial consequences. Munich Re [a large insurer] has recently stated that the costs of storms, floods, cyclones and bushfires in Australia will increase from the current $6.3 billion a year, to an estimated $23 billion by 2050 if “business as usual” continues.Fossil fuels particularly coal, must be phased out quickly and replaced by clean energy otherwise this planet will change disastrously.PricewaterhouseCoopers (UK, Nov 2012) found it is almost certain we will not stay under500 ppm carbon dioxide by 2050. They say “businesses, governments and communitiesacross the world need to plan for a warming world—not just 2°C, but 4°C, or even 6° C."The World Bank report (Nov 2012) says a rise of 4°C will produce "extreme heat-waves,declining global food stocks, loss of ecosystems and biodiversity, and life-threatening sealevel rise.”The problem fred is not the scientists, but the people [eg, attitudes to the carbon tax, profligate energy use ] and the politicians. They have been told for years what needs to be done. Social inertia, not climate inertia, is the problem. Society must immediately further

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